I had to google Gaia to know what you meant and I believe you are right. But sometimes humor can become a real force when used effectively. I saw this yesterday and LMAO. It is only a 50 second youtube video but really what may be the future for tar sands oil. They propose bringing this tar sands oil even into states such as CA where we are now exporting oil from fracking old wells and of course new ones. I hope you can see the reason I laughed:

This is a two page article from Rolling Stone Mag. It was most difficult to try and choose a single quote since it seemed that within every paragraph there was at least one. I gave up and just went with the first paragraph:

It got so hot in Australia in January that the weather service had to add two new colors to its charts. A few weeks later, at the other end of the planet, new data from the CryoSat-2 satellite showed 80 percent of Arctic sea ice has disappeared. We're not breaking records anymore; we're breaking the planet. In 50 years, no one will care about the fiscal cliff or the Euro crisis. They'll just ask, "So the Arctic melted, and then what did you do?"

10 days. That's how long we have to flood the State Department with comments opposing Keystone XL.

For the next ten days our friends across the movement are coordinating a 'Comment Sprint' to submit hundreds of thousands of comments against the pipeline -- hopefully hitting 1 million in total.

If you've already submitted a comment, keep reading: you're able to submit more than one, and in fact, you should. We want to show that people are opposed to the pipeline for many reasons, all of them grounded in hard facts, so every day for ten days, we'll focus on a new reason to oppose the pipeline and submit new comments.

The State Department's review has been heavy on politics and light on science, so the more we focus on the facts, the stronger our case to the President and the public will be to stop the pipeline.

The first day of the comment sprint is today. The first issue we're focusing on is how the pipeline undermines energy security. We need to clear about one thing: TransCanada wants this pipeline so they can get tar sands oil to export.

President Obama's job is to decide whether the pipeline is in the US national interest. TransCanada has shown that it's not. In filings to the State Department and contracts with refiners, they've spelled out their plans to pad their profits by exporting it to the international market where it will fetch a higher price -- putting more money in the pockets of big oil and accelerating tar sands development in Canada.

Can you submit a comment to the President and State Department explaining the energy security case for stopping the pipeline? Click here to submit your comment: act.350.org/letter/kxl-sprint-day-1/

To hit a million comments, it will take a lot of us pitching in in different ways. At 350, we won't email you every day for 10 days (more likely 4 or 5), but we will use social media and other tools at our disposal to promote the push every day between now and the 22nd. In particular, we will be relying on our Social Media Team to share crucial info about each day's issue -- if you'd like to join the Team and help super-charge key content over the next ten days, click here: act.350.org/signup/social/

Keystone XL is a climate disaster, and an economic loser. If built, it would carry 800,000 barrels a day of tar sands to export for the next 50 years, leaving a toxic legacy for communities along the route, and a massive carbon footprint on the atmosphere. And we're going to do whatever we can to stop it.

Will your great-great grandchildren die of thirst?Posted on April 21, 2013 by Vi Waln

President Barack Obama must soon make a life or death decision. He holds the future of our planet in his hands as he contemplates approving or disapproving the application for a Presidential Permit for TransCanada to build their Keystone tar sands oil pipeline through our treaty lands.

Last week over 200 people signed up to speak at the State Department’s hearing held in Grand Island, Nebraska. I listened to members of the Cowboy-Indian-Alliance speak against the construction of TransCanada’s pipeline. At risk is the Ogallala Aquifer. This vast, vital water source serves humans, animals and crops in at least eight states.

Over the past three years I have written several pieces on the proposed Keystone XL pipeline and the danger it poses to Earth’s survival. Still, there are mindless politicians on every level of government who could care less about life-threatening oil pipeline ruptures. In fact, all they care about is being re-elected to office. Politicians who accept campaign funds from oil companies sell their souls for free money. Many politicians are akin to lifeless robots. They obviously do not possess the critical thinking skills required to plan for the survival of the coming Seven Generations.

There have been countless oil spills on both land and in the waters resulting in irreversible contamination. Many humans, animals, plant and birds have suffered from these man-made disasters. If the current rush to mine all the oil and minerals from the Earth continues, our children will have a very difficult time surviving.

The Oglala Lakota Nation and the Black Hills Treaty Council have both gone on record opposing tar sands mining operations in Canada and the building of the proposed Keystone oil pipeline. Both the tribe and treaty council are also in support of the Mother Earth Accord which was adopted by numerous tribes, including the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, and presented to President Barack Obama.

Furthermore, most Indian Reservations are lacking in homeland security. How would you react if someone invaded your home and threatened your family? I would not be very kind to anyone who made the personal choice to invade my home. The construction of the Keystone XL pipeline is a homeland security issue affecting all of us. Putting a large pipeline to carry undisclosed dangerous chemicals over our primary water source is probably the most lethal terrorist threat we’ve ever faced.

When this pipeline ruptures, as it surely will, where will our water come from? Where will we find water to drink, use in our gardens or give to our pets/livestock if the aquifer we depend is contaminated with tar sands oil?

The federal government created the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) after the 9/11 attacks to make the United States of America a safer place to live. The Homeland Security Act was signed into law on November 25, 2002. The mission of DHS is basically “to ensure a homeland that is safe, secure, and resilient against terrorism and other hazards.” When you browse their webpage you will see several areas DHS focuses on, including counterterrorism, border security, preparedness, response, recovery, immigration and cybersecurity.

I have attended many tribal council meetings and the only areas I have ever heard them discuss are preparedness and response. What about counterterrorism, border security, recovery, immigration and cybersecurity? What about the security of our water? Our tribal governments could create our own DHS “to ensure a homeland that is safe, secure, and resilient against terrorism and other hazards.”

When we make a statement opposing tar sands mining and oil pipeline construction it means we do not support anything associated with these operations. I believe our tribal governments need to fast track some laws about overweight vehicles traveling the roads running through our lands. How much revenue could South Dakota tribes take in if there was a weigh station at every reservation entrance point?

There are so many trucks on the road now and who knows what they are carrying. The covered loads appear highly suspicious. Look at highway 83 which runs through the Rosebud Rez. Overloaded semi-trucks traveling 70-80 mph are extremely hazardous. They are a threat to our homeland security. Many tribal members have died on highway 83 after crashing with a semi-truck.

Our homeland will never be secure as long as these trucks are allowed free passage through our lands. Who will clean up the mess if there is ever a hazard waste spill from a semi-truck next to Sicangu Village or in downtown Mission? How many Lakota children will be affected if this ever happens?

If our tribal governments and elected officials are really serious about their written, approved statements against tar sands oil mining and the construction of new oil pipelines, they must be ready to assert their authority as a sovereign nation to back up the grassroots people/organizations and the homelands they represent. Tribal governments can only make their own legislation stronger by giving the state of South Dakota notice that the transport of oil mining or pipeline construction equipment is banned on any roads running through our reservations. Our tribal governments must work “to ensure a homeland that is safe, secure, and resilient against terrorism and other hazards.” It is their job.

It is our responsibility to advocate for Mother Earth’s survival and to protect our sacred water for the coming generations. Be one of the million and show your love for your descendants by making a comment against the Keystone XL pipeline by Earth Day which is April 22, 2013.

You can enter your remarks here and your comment could read: “Please do not jeopardize our Ogallala Aquifer by building this death project. Our descendants deserve better. You do not have a right to take away their chances for a good life full of uncontaminated drinking water by risking an oil spill or leak from the Keystone pipeline running into the Ogallala Aquifer. Please do not approve the Presidential Permit.”

Canada is considering bypassing the beleaguered Keystone XL pipeline—which would carry oil from tar sands deposits in Alberta to the US and the Gulf of Mexico—by shipping across the Arctic Ocean instead. The proposal is in its infancy, reports the Alaska Dispatch, but is developing as Keystone XL and other proposed pipelines to British Columbia and Quebec remain in limbo.

The Arctic Ocean scenarios would also include a pipeline—north from Alberta's tar sands through (sparsely settled, presumably uncontested) regions along the Mackenzie River Valley and on to the Arctic coastal town of Tuktoyaktuk, from there to be shipped on tankers to Asia or Europe. From the Alaska Dispatch:

Alaska could find itself helplessly watching large tankers loaded with oil and gas pass by its shores. With little spill-response infrastructure in Alaska's Arctic—no deepwater port exists, for instance—the state is sitting vulnerable, [says Alaska Lt. Gov. Mead] Treadwell, a former chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission. "If somebody is seriously talking about building an oil pipeline that would put oil on the water to go through Alaska waters," he said, "I believe we would have the time through diplomatic negotiation to be able to meet the challenge."

Is Alaska nearing the day when large oil tankers will sail by its Arctic shoreline, carrying Canadian tar sands oil to foreign markets? The provincial government of Alberta is toying with the idea, sinking money into a study to find out if an Arctic shipping plan makes more sense than moving its oil through the proposed Keystone XL pipeline to the Lower 48, or pipelines west or east through Canada.

Contemplating such Arctic voyages harkens back to the oil boom of Alaska's North Slope.

Shortly after wildcatters struck it big at Prudhoe Bay, Humble Oil, the predecessor to Exxon Corp., tested an Arctic shipping route in 1969. Dubbed the Manhattan project, as the vessel was named the Manhattan, the mission was in part to see whether transporting crude in tanker vessels from Alaska's Arctic oil fields was feasible, rather than building the 800-mile trans-Alaska pipeline to ship the oil to the ice-free port of Valdez.

The test run proved it wasn't possible to do so year-round, but 44 years later climate change is transforming the Far North, with new shipping lanes opening up and Arctic dreamers betting on a boom.

The Canadian pipeline would run from Alberta's tar sands, north through the Mackenzie River Valley, to the Arctic coastal town of Tuktoyaktuk, where the oil would be shipped on tanker vessels to Asia or Europe, according to the CBC News. The proposal, still very much in its infancy, is being considered while regulatory approval for the Keystone XL pipeline to the U.S. Gulf Coast remains in limbo and other proposed pipelines heading to British Columbia or toward Quebec face their own obstacles.

The sea-faring alternative would be a nightmarish specter for environmentalists who have long argued the Arctic is too fragile, too valuable, to risk a major industry mishap.

Royal Dutch Shell executives know better than anybody the immense -- and costly -- challenges to controversial oil operations in the Arctic. From lawsuits to regulatory red tape to the grounding of its Kulluk drillship earlier this year, the Netherlands-based oil giant has encountered a plethora of obstacles in its more than $5 billion quest to tap offshore oil in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas above Alaska.

But Alberta is already facing its own hurdles as regulations and critics have stalled the Keystone XL pipeline project. Building a pipeline through the sparsely populated lands north of Alberta and shipping from the Arctic could be a solution to bringing the controversial tar sands oil to foreign markets.

“It's not a surprise. Arctic energy shipments are very obvious possibilities because of the ice receding and technology improvements," said Alaska Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, a former chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission.

Ironically, as Alberta contemplates shipping oil through the Arctic, Alaska is subsidizing an effort to build another 800-mile pipeline to move natural gas to the south. Just as the oil is moved from the North Slope via the trans-Alaska pipeline, Alaska wants to see a pipeline carrying natural gas to Valdez or another Southcentral port, where it would be liquefied and shipped on tanker vessels. The project, funded with up to $500 million in state subsidies, is estimated to cost $45 billion to $65 billion.

So why isn't Alaska looking to ship its natural gas on vessels across the Arctic Ocean, rather than building a giant, expensive pipeline?

"We don't have the water depth anywhere near Prudhoe Bay or Port Thompson like the Canadians or Russians do,” Treadwell said, adding that if one of Alaska's oil producers were to propose Arctic shipping, he's sure "the state would be cooperative.”

Oil and gas companies operating in Russia's Arctic are looking at shipping LNG on ice-breaking equipped tankers. And Korea Gas Co. has shown interest in recent years of shipping LNG on the Arctic Ocean from Canada's Mackenzie River Valley, a natural-gas rich area.

"Geo-strategically, I think every one of the five Arctic coastal states, plus Iceland, all have oil and gas potential," Treadwell said.

If some of these proposals come to fruition, Alaska could find itself helplessly watching large tankers loaded with oil and gas pass by its shores. With little spill-response infrastructure in Alaska's Arctic -- no deepwater port exists, for instance -- the state is sitting vulnerable, Treadwell said.

"If somebody is seriously talking about building an oil pipeline that would put oil on the water to go through Alaska waters," he said, "I believe we would have the time through diplomatic negotiation to be able to meet the challenge."A vision from the past

In many ways, what Alberta is studying is a repeat of an experiment from nearly a half-century ago. Back when Prudhoe Bay was on the cusp of a boom, Humble Oil commissioned the first-ever commercial transit of the Northwest Passage.

The mission was designed to test whether Arctic Ocean travel made more sense than one of two proposed pipelines. The pipelines under consideration included what is now known as the trans-Alaska pipeline and a second option traveling across Canada to America's East Coast.

In August 1969, the 1,005-foot-long S.S. Manhattan launched from the Delaware River, headed north and cut its way west via the Northwest Passage. It made its way to Prudhoe Bay, where it picked up a ceremonial barrel of crude and returned home. The trip, which included Canadian and U.S. Coast Guard escorts, was a success, but winter travel later proved impossible. Environmental concerns further compromised the concept of shipping oil across the Arctic Ocean.

Alaska has already begun to study the need for deepwater ports in the Arctic to accommodate needs of both the U.S. Coast Guard and the shipping industry. Ports in the Arctic would allow the Coast Guard to have a more sustained and nimble presence. Last week, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Robert Papp testified before a U.S. Senate committee that increased traffic in the Bering Sea was contributing to a growing potential for disaster in the Arctic. He told the committee that maritime governance is needed in the Arctic, according to a report on his remarks published in the E&E Reporter.

State and national leaders have talked for years about building ports in Alaska's Arctic, analyzing which sites above and below the Bering Strait would make sense, from the islands of St. Paul to St. Lawrence Island near the Bering Strait to Nome or nearby Port Clarence to Kotzebue, which sits above the strait. But like much of the discussion on how to get Alaska's natural gas to market, talk about ports is so far only that -- thinking, planning and studying at the moment.

Treadwell said that's not necessarily a bad thing: “We have a much better idea of what we want than we did even a year ago."

Meantime, marine safety, whether it's from traffic coming through the Bering Strait or further south in the Aleutian Islands, should be the number one priority for Alaska, Treadwell said. In May, the eight Arctic nations will sign a mutual aid oil spill agreement, building on similar cooperation already in place for search and rescue needs. Ice breaker design, port design and vessel traffic tracking programs are also all moving forward, Treadwell said.

The government of Canada’s province of Alberta is looking at yet another pipeline option to get its oil to market should the Keystone XL or Northern Gateway pipeline proposals not come to fruition. Calgary consulting firm Canatec Associates International Ltd. has been hired by the province to study the feasibility of moving crude from the oilsands up to a port in the Northwest Territories.

Related: Will melting Arctic open up LNG shipping lanes?Alaska governor seeks 'alignment' from oil companies on exporting gas to Asia

It has been estimated $30 billion a year stays locked in Alberta’s oilsands because there is no way to get it to market.

TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline to the Texas Gulf Coast still needs the approval of the U.S. State Department and President Barak Obama.

Its proposal to convert an existing pipeline to pump bitumen eastward to refineries in Quebec and New Brunswick is also controversial.

Meantime, Enbridge’s pipeline proposal west to Kitimat is meeting with fierce resistance in B.C. from environmentalists and Aboriginal groups.

So the Alberta government is looking at another option to build a pipeline from the oilsands up the McKenzie River Valley to a proposed deep-water port at Tuktoyaktuk, a community in Canada’s Northwest Territories (N.W.T.)

From there it would be loaded onto oil tankers and head to Asian and European markets.

“Really it speaks to the importance that access to markets has,” said Pembina Institute policy analyst Nathan Lemphers.

“The industry is facing an impending bottle neck of take-away capacity. They don’t have the capacity to get their product to market because pipelines are harder to build then they have been in the past,” he said.

But a northern route could be just as difficult to sell as the other pipeline options on the table, he added.

Northwest Territories Premier Bob McLeod has said he is interested in a northern pipeline.

McLeod recently completed a power-devolution deal with Ottawa that could make the project even more attractive for the N.W.T.

Doug Matthews, an Alberta energy writer who worked for the N.W.T. government on resource issues for 25 years, said the proposed pipeline would need to accommodate at least 500,000 barrels a day to be feasible.

“Such a line of course, and given that it would be shipping bitumen I would think primarily, is going to attract an awful lot of environmental opposition,” he said.

But Matthews said most northerners, keen to develop their own natural resources, would be supportive.

“There’s no reason why N.W.T. resources couldn’t link into that pipe,” he said.

Getting the pipeline built would only be one part of the equation, Matthews said.

“The port itself is relatively undeveloped right now in terms of tankers. It’s never been used for that other than barge loading and off-loading,” he said.

“You would need some fairly significant dredging in order to allow the larger tankers to come in and load up, or run a pipe from the coastline farther offshore to the deeper waters,” he said.

Hughes County, OK, May 14th, 2013Early this morning Bailey and Holly, both of whom are local Oklahomans and with Cross Timbers Earth First!, walked onto a Keystone XL active construction site in Hughes County, Oklahoma and locked themselves to concrete filled barrels obstructing the use of heavy machinery used in the construction of the pipeline.Bailey and Holly are part of Cross Timbers Earth First! , a regional chapter of the Earth First! movement, which has been carrying out ecological direct actions for over 30 years. According to its members, Cross Timbers Earth First! also endorses Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance, a growing coalition of groups and individuals dedicated to stopping the expansion of tar sands infrastructure throughout the Great Plains. Read breaking news coverage:http://gptarsandsresistance.org/

For the last two years, all across the country, people have said the same thing to us: “We’re ready to fight.”

And as the planet lurches past 400 parts per million concentrations of CO2, the moment has come, the moment to ask you to do hard, important, powerful things. The last two weeks of July are, statistically, the hottest stretch of the year. This year we want to make them politically hot too. Which means we need you, out on the front line. We need some of you to risk going to jail, and all of you to show up and speak out. And since it’s a hard thing to ask, this letter is going to be a little longer than usual. (If you want to cut to the chase, though, the list of actions can be found here.)

We’re calling this next phase of the fight “Summer Heat.” Over the course of the final weeks of July, from the Pacific Northwest to the coast of Maine, from the Keystone pipeline route to the White House where the administration has broken its promise to put solar on the roof, to the Utah desert where they’re getting ready for the first tar sands mine in the US, we’re going to try and get across the essential message: it’s time to stand up – peacefully but firmly — to the industry that is wrecking our future.

We believe that mass action can breathe life into even the most hardened political fights, and so these actions will all aim to bring together thousands of people to stand together — perhaps sometimes on the wrong side of the law.

For people on the front lines of fossil fuel extraction, these fights are often, properly, about the local immediate impacts. And now all of us us, even those fortunate enough to live without that daily trauma, need to add the weight of our anger and hope as well. It’s one big fight. Front-line communities need and deserve reinforcements, pouring in to help the people who have been carrying these struggles as they begin to impact us all.

It won’t be just July, of course. In June friends are organizing “Fearless Summer” protests at mining and drilling sites around the country. In Canada, First Nations connected to the Idle No More movement are hatching plans for a “Sovereignty Summer” which could see“coordinated nonviolent direct actions” on Indigenous lands that are in the midst of fierce anti-extraction battles. meanwhile, our colleagues at CREDO continue to collect names pledged to civil disobedience should Keystone XL move forward. But Summer Heat will be a powerful focus — a chance for thousands of us to show the courage we need to lower the temperature.

We’ve got to go on offense elsewhere, and in the last few months young people have been showing us how. The rapid spread of the divestment movement across college campuses should provide courage to everyone: we got goose bumps when the students at Rhode Island School of Design, occupying their president’s office last week to demand divestment, lowered a banner out the window: “We May Be Art Students, But We Can Still do the Math.”

Look – this movement isn’t made up of professional protesters. For the most part, it’s students, teachers, retired people, civil servants, farmers, businesswomen, fisher folk, artists, mailmen, ministers. It’s people whose homes were demolished by Hurricane Sandy, or who just had an oil pipeline burst in their backyard.

Just the other day Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson went on TV and declared: “My philosophy is to make money.” And he lives that philosophy by compromising the future of the earth. And so those of us who have a more complicated philosophy need to stand up. We can’t outspend him, but we have other currencies to work in: passion, creativity, spirit. And sometimes we have to spend our bodies.

Here’s how it works. This is a list of the actions planned so far. A few more may be added in the weeks ahead as we keep working with allies. Find the one nearest you. Start making plans to show up. Be there when the time comes.

We’ll have people there to train for the actions — in every case there will be options for people who don’t want to risk arrest, but if you’re ready to take it to the next level, there will be lawyers and such on hand to help. This will be peaceful, dignified, but firm. We’re serious.

Our hope is that this summer will be a historic show of solidarity not just with the Americans who suffer most from the fossil fuel industry, but with the people across the planet whose lives are at risk as the world warms — and indeed with the planet itself, beleaguered but still so worth fighting for.

If you weren’t needed, we wouldn’t ask. But in a fight this big, we are all needed, now more than ever.

RAPID CITY -- This morning at 9:00 a.m. the United States Department of State attempted to hold what they call a consultation with tribal representatives of the Great Plains Red Nations regarding the effects of the Keystone XL Pipeline on sacred sites. However, tribal, traditional and community members from the Lakota, Dakota, Nakota, Nez Perce, Ponca, and Pawnee demonstrated unprecedented unity and declared that our people would not participate in what was designed to appear to be a negotiation with Red Nations .

Oglala Sioux Tribal President Bryan Brewer made a statement dismissing the gathering as a sham because no leadership of the United States was present. Instead Obama’s administration sent low level clerks to meet with our tribal and treaty leaders. This disrespect to the provisions of the 1868 Ft. Laramie Treaty between the Lakota, Arapahoe, Cheyenne and the United States, as well as violations to international law and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, will not be tolerated.

We will not negotiate about our sacred sites or any assault on Unci Maca (Mother Earth) or Mni Wicozani (Through Water There is Life). As tribal officials left the room the grassroots people of Owe Aku’s Moccasins on the Ground began to chant “Sacred Sites, Worth the Fight, Territory by Treaty Right” until the U.S. functionaries were forced to shut down the meeting.For more information please contact Kent Lebsock, Moccasins on the Ground, at 646-233-4406 or 720-469-1178

And with these firm words the TransCanada representatives were kicked out of Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation last week. The seemingly aloof TransCanada officials showed up at the Tribal Office in Eagle Butte, South Dakota in an attempt to win the tribe over to the pipeline, but were met with a swift, firm response. Robin LeBeau, Cheyenne River Sioux Councilwoman for District 5, saw them in the parking lot and promptly told them off.

The encounter was caught on video:

Robin LeBeau:

“I don’t want no TransCanada people here…I’m going to fight hard and if I find anyone else here I’m going to bring more people in abundance to tell you guys to leave.”

“This pipeline is the most destructive pipeline. You’re going to rape, steal and destroy everything that is for us….everything, our land, our culture, our water.”

And what do the TransCanada reps suggest the Tribe do with these valid concerns? Write a letter to the CEO. What’s his name, again? Their response:

“I don’t even know the guy’s name….. um…they have a website…”

Really?! Thats the best these guys can do? Like writing a letter to Russ Girling is going to convince this multinational corporation to stop building their multi-billion dollar project and respect the lives of indigenous peoples. This corporation has demonstrated numerous times that they only care about their profits and will bully and bankrupt anyone who stands in their way.

Tribal members know it. They aren’t buying TransCanada’s false promises and understand the threat that toxic tar sands pose to their Sacred Water, burial grounds, and historic landmarks. The Keystone XL pipeline would cut right through their Treaty Territory and some of their most Sacred Sites. (You can watch part 2 of the video here.)Pipe Path by Cheyenne River

The last several months has seen the indigenous resistance along the proposed KXL Northern segment continue to grow. Just this last week the Native News Network reported that the National Congress of American Indians, “the nation’s oldest, largest and most representative American Indian and Alaska Native organization in the country,” publicly released a statement of opposition to Keystone XL and criticized the State Department’s flawed “Environmental Impact Statement”.

Additionally, the Moccasins on the Ground Tour of Resistance will travel to Cheyenne River in mid-June to continue to build this resistance and unite the Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota peoples against this toxic intruder.

By now Russ Girling shouldn’t need a handwritten letter to know the message coming from Red Nations along the pipeline route: “Go Away!”

An urgent conversation needs to be held about the parallels between sexual violence, conquest, colonization, environmental racism and the rape of Mother Earth. All are related.

Let’s talk about environmental racism in regard to KXL. Ben Chavis (civil rights activist in 1994) coined “environmental racism” as “the enactment or enforcement of any policy, practice or regulation that negatively affects the environment of low-income and/or racially homogenous communities at a disparate rate than affluent communities.” Repeatedly this environmental racism clear-cuts the way for American economic development. The American economic system is founded on conquest mentality like Manifest Destiny, The Doctrine of Discovery and Papal bulls that dehumanize Indigenous people. Indigenous people on Turtle Island are all too familiar with that sad history, while America remains in denial. Environmental pollution does not discriminate but it deliberately targets areas where no one cares about who lives there, which is typically where Native American communities, other minority populations or poor people are located. Native communities are viewed by the colonizers as inherently “dirty, dispensable” communities where waste and toxins can be deposited. These reservations communities are located on or near the fifty six (56) waterways identified as being affected by the pipeline. TransCanada is invading on water bodies that are owned by Native senior water users as established by the Winters Doctrine in a US Court. This is an echo of Manifest Destiny, and will not be tolerated by Treaty defenders.

February 2013 statistics point out that the most poverty stricken populations in the Nation are on South Dakota reservations. TransCanada has capitalized on that by traveling and sending letters to each tribal office on the corridor offering funds to a population in need, provided they accept the pipeline. They are now even offering funds to host giant pow wows…..new forms of colonization. Our friend and ally Winona LaDuke calls it “predator economics.”

This mindset is so insidious and ingrained in the minds of government officials in Canada and the United States as they perpetuate another form of violence, that of Nation violence. It is a colonial legacy of the United States to force policy on communities that are perceived to have less power. In this case the ranchers and farmers of the Midwest have fallen into this category, by losing their land through eminent domain action. The conquest is aimed at our Treaty water and lands.

In March of 2013, I traveled to Ottawa, Ontario in Canada, carrying the International Treaty to Protect the Sacred against Tar Sands, which was recently invoked by the Ihanktonwan Oyate (people); Pawnee Nation and the Southern Ponca Nation in Pickstown, SD during January of 2013. Subsequently, the Treaty was signed in Ottawa by five other First Nations who oppose Tar Sands Development due to the devastation of their homelands.

Following the historic Treaty signing at a community center in Ottawa, it was no accident that we were offered a ride back to our hotel by two First Nations grandmothers who were driving across Canada to bring attention to the numerous murdering and missing Native women in Canada. We climbed into a van that had the pictures on it of missing and murdered Native women. The two grandmothers driving the van explained that they were on a walk across Canada to bring attention to this outrage; which they urgently believe is related to industrial and mining development on or adjacent to Native lands. They were adamant about telling us to keep this in mind when stopping the KXL Pipeline, because it would protect the women, children and families of our nations. As we traveled to the hotel, I could feel the spirits of the murdered and missing women traveling with us in the van. Upon arrival, the grandmothers showed us the picture on the van of their niece who is still missing, along with all the other beautiful young women plastered on the outside of the van. Eerily, as they urged me not to forget this, I thought of the recent news release in South Dakota of the six hundred (600) man camp that would be located near numerous reservation communities in South Dakota, north of Colome, SD. The pictures of the young girls on the van still haunt me as I continue the fight against KXL and TransCanada. I will not forget.

Why is this important? This question leads us into a conversation of colonization, conquest and power. The Department of Justice continues to release figures citing that one in three Native women will be raped in their lifetime by non-Native perpetrators. This is 2.5 times higher than the at large population which states that one in five women will be raped in their lifetime. The same DOJ figures cite that 86% of perpetrators were reported as non-Native. The mere existence of these figures behooves Tribal Nation leaders and everyday people, Native Women Advocates and families to mobilize to prevent the coming of these so called “man camps.” If we look at the sad statistics coming to light on the Ft. Berthold Reservation in the Bakken Range; rape, prostitution and murder are now becoming common occurrences in communities stretched to breaking points. Are we content to remain in the “culture of silence” as this threat invades our Treaty and aboriginal lands? We are mindful of the great leader Sitting Bull’s words, as reported by Susan Leflesche who said that while he sat in captivity at Ft. Randall, he worried most about the women and children and what was in store for them if they could not be protected. History has proven him to be prophetic on that danger.

The other thought that comes to mind, is the psychological impact of intimidation that presents itself with the location of man camps made possible by presidential permits. This certainly triggers historical trauma responses imbedded in our genetic memory of the coming of garrisons such as Ft. Randall, Ft. Thompson, Ft. Yates, Ft. Peck and the list goes on. We already know what happens when man camps are created, the evidence is clear in the Bakken Range. Meantime, poverty stricken non Native towns along the corridor hold on to the hope that the KXL will change their lives for the better. If so, why are they bringing in six hundred men? KXL will certainly change their lives forever in the form of climate destruction.

Scholar/activist Andrea Smith speaks to the impact of colonization on sexual violence as related to colonization and conquest. It is worth the survival of our grandchildren to listen to the conversations she has created around these issues. She points out that colonization normalizes uneven gender power. Communities often will side with perpetrators and not the victims, thus violators are not often held accountable for their crimes. In this case, TransCanada is in the role of a perpetrator. Let’s look at environmental racism again. Racism is a process where certain people are viewed as being pure and those being colonized are treated as being dirty. The view of the body of a Native woman is a parallel to the way the United States is treating Mother Earth, Ina Maka. Our lands are invadable and rapeable. Not long ago, at Sand Creek, our heroic Cheyenne grandmothers’ private parts were cut off and paraded by the military. It is not so different now.

It is important to accept that we live in one of the most violent countries in the world and for all affected groups to unite and mobilize in protecting our home fronts. Native people, farmers and ranchers, domestic violence advocates, elected officials and politicians and families must step up to the call of leadership. Our Native prophecies state that there will be a time to stand up for what is important, and that time is now!! Keystone XL and TransCanada must be stopped through unprecedented unity to save our land, water and our legacy.

My fight against this recent and ongoing oppression is fueled by the memory of the founding of the White Buffalo Calf Woman’s’ Society in 1977, on the Rosebud Reservation. At the time, I was the first President of the Society and along with others was guided by Sicangu grandmothers who helped us in founding the first Native Women’s Shelter in the Nation. This Society Shelter still exists and continues to protect our women and shelter from the colonized behavior of domestic violence. I urge the White Buffalo Calf Woman Society and all other family coalitions in South Dakota to enter the fight with determination to stop this threat against our families and Ina Maka, Mother Earth.

The Sierra Club announced Tuesday that it is suing the State Department for documents related to a draft environmental review of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline.The green group alleges the administration is withholding documents regarding the consulting firm it hired to assess the Canada-to-Texas pipeline.The Sierra Club contends the consultancy that conducted the analysis had a conflict of interest because it had “financial ties to the pipeline company and the American Petroleum Institute, one of Keystone XL’s most active and vocal lobbyists.”Read more: http://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2013/06/s ... html#links

In case you haven't heard, our movement's all-hands-on-deck moment is here: the State Department has released its Keystone XL assessment, and it is a scandal.

Not only does it repeat Big Oil lies about the Keystone XL that break with the scientific community, but it was quietly released to Big Oil before Congress, the American people or anyone else.

The decision is now in President Obama's hands - and that's why on Monday, February 3rd, we are joining with CREDO, the Sierra Club, Rainforest Action Network, 350 and other groups to organize nationwide protest vigils to send a clear and urgent message: Keystone XL is a climate disaster, and President Obama must reject it.

In this moment, it's especially important that we come out of the gate with a strong message to the president.

That's why we need thousands of people, in hundred of communities around the country, to come together on Monday and show that we are prepared to hold the president to his commitment to take action on climate, and reject the Keystone XL pipeline.

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot post attachments in this forum